Boston-based marketing agency Connelly Partners is opening a Canadian office in Vancouver as it makes its first foray into the market north of the border.

Called CP West, the office has been built out of VRX Studios, which Connelly Partners acquired in April 2021. At the time of the acquisition, industry veteran Nadine Cole (pictured right) was hired to oversee a turnaround of VRX’s business. The company, which specializes in photography for clients in the hospitality sector, was hit especially hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. Cole, who is a former senior VP and general manager of Cossette for Western Canada and the U.S., adds that the acquisition of VRX was made with the intention of opening a Canadian office for Connelly.

Cole joined as chief operating officer and “spent the first year developing more breadth for the business,” she tells strategy, expanding VRX’s scope from photography to add video, and introducing new verticals including sports, tourism and architecture. “That created the opportunity for us to find clients we could work with that weren’t looking for the support of a large agency of record, they just needed a bit of help.”

Cole will remain president of VRX, while adding the title of managing director at CP West. With VRX Studios up and running, and fully in the black again, “this was the ideal time to strike” Cole says.

Connelly Partners is launching the Vancouver office with a list of clients that include healthy snack brand Chiwis, Wyndham Hotels and Resorts EMEA, and CloudCare – an AI-driven digital companion for people living with dementia. The agency recently launched new work for CloudCare that draws upon its expertise in health marketing.

“We’ve built a portfolio of work that allows us to show what we’ve done in the west,” Cole says, noting that this is work that stands apart from that done by Connelly’s Boston and Dublin-based teams, where the agency’s other offices are situated. Still, the agency plans to operate on a globally integrated service model that will see it drawing upon expertise from across its three offices as the work dictates.

All told, the agency has 150 employees, with 15 based in Vancouver and “some overlap” with VRX Studios. It plans to add more employees through the Vancouver office, but is hiring across the west coast of Canada and the U.S.